A lot of people were flipping out that our defense wasn't stopping the Pats. Heck, Brady threw for 388 yards. The Pats had 34 minutes TOP. They outgained us by over 100 yds offense and ran 85 plays to our 55. They got 26 first downs to our 17. Sounds like they dominated us right? Sounds like we got one of those flukey wins where the best team just couldn't score and we won?

Except the best team DID win and it wasn't a fluke. Our game plan exposed the flaw in Belichicks gameplan. Perhaps I should say flaws, for it was plural. But first, to that offensive domination of the Pats team that we couldn't get off the field and passed all over us. Before i even got to the number I knew the one stat we'd lead the Pats in offensively: yards per play. We especially led them in yards per pass and were tied in yards per rush. All of that, every last bit of it, was according to plan. Heck, it wasn't like it was a secret. Everyone on both teams knew what the plan was. It was this:

Stop Marshawn Lynch. Put men up there, risk giving up the deep strike, and force Russell Wilson to carry the team. The flaw in that plan? Pete and Russell knew it was coming so they discussed beforehand having Wilson scramble about to buy time to make that deep pass. The other flaw in that plan? Wilson has a cannon for an arm and he's stopped heaving up those floaters. He CAN burn a team deep.

You see, Belichicks plan was predicated on the idea that he couldn't.

But there was one more flaw in the Pats plan.

Earl Thomas.

Many people were worried about the Pats short passing game going into today. Some called for ET to play up closer to help out. This would have been a mistake. What ET does is play center field. He uses his blazing speed to make sure we don't get burnt on the deep passes ourselves. This is an important role for him, moreso than your average safety, because we have taller, slightly slower CB's who press and disrupt. Those kind of CB's can only play the hardnosed smashmouth, in your face style of defense they play precisely because Earl Thomas is hanging back, making sure no one burns us deep.

So the next time you feel like ranting that the other team is passing all over us and we're playing a soft zone formation. Don't. Just. Don't. ET is playing back. We are not giving up the TD.

Todays game exemplified that strategy. We let them march downfield. We let them dink and dunk passes, but not much running game, make their 3rd and 10 conversions and get into the red zone.

ahhh, yes, the Red Zone, where elite NFL offenses go to die. You see, once there is no threat of the deep ball getting behind us - because that's out the back of the end zone, Earl Thomas CAN play up closer to the line of scrimmage. The results all season have been pretty predictable: drive stalls, field goal. Tom Brady, to his credit, put two in the endzone in the first half, breaking a pretty long streak of offensive red zone futility by some pretty good offenses.

Earl Thomas is a playmaker and a ball hawk. We've been waiting all year for him to finally hang onto one. Today he got one, he should have gotten two. The first should have been a pick 6 101 yard return. The second would have been if Bryant hangs onto his block. But do you notice the pattern?

both times happened when their offense was in our red zone. Brady was throwing into the end zone.

That's how our defense works. It's built to give up field goals, but let you eat up yardage getting in field goal range. Little bits of yardage per bite. No big plays deep. All of it in front of us for 5 or 6 yards and we'll hit you really hard in exchange for those plays after plays of a little bit here and a little bit there so you can hang your helmet on that field goal.

The flaw of Belichicks plan should have been obvious to him: His plan allows our offense to strike deep for quick TD's when our defense is designed to let the pats run out the clock dinking and dunking away for FG's. Stuffing Lynch cannot work against us. If you stuff Lynch, you leave Russell to burn you deep and you cannot let that happen because our defense will allow 5 scoring drives out of 12 and those are mostly FG's. Kudos to the Pats, btw, in making two touchdowns, but if ET hangs onto that ball, we win this game 31- 16.

Richard Sherman doesn't just wanna get in your head, he wants to build a vacation home there.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

It was a pass play on 3rd and one for one reason. Your coaching staff didn't think they could convert on a run play. If that pass is actually complete, Welker gets killed. For a third time.

And the 12 should take a bow. On the verge of going down 3 scores, there was no wavering in the crowd.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

It was a pass play on 3rd and one for one reason. Your coaching staff didn't think they could convert on a run play. If that pass is actually complete, Welker gets killed. For a third time.

And the 12 should take a bow. On the verge of going down 3 scores, there was no wavering in the crowd.

I hear ya, I personally thought it was a stupid call. Pats have LEARNED how to run, so the worse case you get a FG and eat up MORE CLOCK.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

When Bill Belichick declined a Seahawks penalty that would have left Russell Wilson with 2nd and 19, and instead left him on 3rd and 10, I took that as Hoodie's grudging nod of respect to Wilson and his passing ability.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

Your team was 1/6 in the red zone.

Yes with an Int grounding ending the half for one, and a poor play call for an INT for a second.... I give credit for the INT, but not for the bone headed int grounding... (although I personally was shocked they called it thought Branch was close enough but oh well..) EITHER of those done differently the Pats win, I dont think your D caused either ...The Intentional grounding the hawks were not close to sacking brady, and the INT well I said before 3rd and 1 w a 10 point lead RUN the ball..

To the OP - Thank you for this awesome post. Now that you have pointed out the role of ET in the defense in such detail, I can stop being one of those ignorant fans screaming about zone coverage on 3rd down.

I whole heartedly agree with the OP. I've always said ET is the security blanket for the entire defense, the safety net that allows the big boys like Browner to bully and mug people at the LOS without having to lose too much sleep about giving up the big play. Guys like Sherman and Lynch get a lot more attention, but for my money, Earl is the MVP of this team. Moving him up into 1 on 1 coverage really takes away a massive part of our defense's ability to do what they do.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

Lololololol. Love the excuse making. Dude, the Pats ran for a whopping 90 yards on the ground, with MOST of those coming off of draw plays with >5 yards to go (ie. situations where we had to respect the possibility of a long pass). If they tried to run it in that goal line situation, they'd have run straight into a wall of meat.

And I love your continued berrating of Aarington and Chung, like they are somehow exempt from being Patriots. They are part of your team. It's a team game. We found the weak link in your team and exploited the shit out of it. You're not quite this big unstopable football juggernaught without any faults that you want to think you are; a big part of the reason you lost is because your secondary sucks (and because you had no respect for our QB or recievers and thus put 8 guys in the box on every play, leaving your sucky secondary short handed).

But you got one thing right; the 12th man is definately for real. You think Tommy respects us now?

FREE PEHAWK

Sac>CANI love Sac with all my heart, and wish I were half as handsome as he.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

So you are admitting that you have boneheads and a bunch of crappy players. Good. Glad we all agree.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

So you are admitting that you have boneheads and a bunch of crappy players. Good. Glad we all agree.

Hellz yeah!

FREE PEHAWK

Sac>CANI love Sac with all my heart, and wish I were half as handsome as he.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

So you are admitting that you have boneheads and a bunch of crappy players. Good. Glad we all agree.

Hellz yeah!

Sorry PatsFan - but I couldn't resist. I admit to missing the game yesterday and only got to watch part way into the 2nd quarter. All due respect, there are some juggernaut players on that team that can definitely get things done. With regards to the balance on the Pats - they have a lot of good young players that are prone to mistakes, as you've mentioned. They literally have 2 great TE's and one well-exploited 5foot-nothin wide receiver who is doing the improbable. Aside from Tom Brady who is AMAZING, the Pats really are pretty ordinary everywhere else. Factor in some interesting play calls and some exploitable players, and the Patriots LOSE. These are observations I think we can all agree on.

Belichick's game plan, as is most team's this year is to stop Lynch and make Wilson beat them over the top while playing Tampa Cover 2 defense.

Well that game plan worked into the 4th quarter, as Wilson had a hard time moving the ball for the entire 2nd and 3rd quarters. If Carroll was smarter he would have been throwing deep ALL game to loosen up those extra defenders in the box.

The 49'ers are going to do the same thing, so Pete and Bevell better dial up a similar game plan.

Hey Salish, really good post man and I agree with much of what you said, but there's a couple of things that I want to address.

SalishHawkFan wrote:So the next time you feel like ranting that the other team is passing all over us and we're playing a soft zone formation. Don't. Just. Don't. ET is playing back. We are not giving up the TD.

Seems kinda weird that you would say this after yesterday, this is the exact way we gave up one of their two TDs. Earl got straight beat on that play.

SalishHawkFan wrote:Todays game exemplified that strategy. We let them march downfield. We let them dink and dunk passes, but not much running game, make their 3rd and 10 conversions and get into the red zone.

OK, wait a sec, are you saying that you think that we are letting them convert all those 3rd downs? That we are letting them march down field? That we could be stopping them but are just choosing not to?

Sorry man, I just can't agree with that. There is just no way that an NFL defense is perfectly happy letting teams sustain drives and convert 3rd down after 3rd down on their way to the red zone. I don't know what the problem is, I don't know why we are having such a hard time stopping other teams on 3rd down, but I do know that it is a problem and I'm pretty certain that the team believes that it's a problem that needs to be fixed.

I just want to add that I absolutely love this defense and I believe that we are one of, if not the best in the league, but that doesn't mean that there aren't any problems or things that could be improved upon. IMO, 3rd down D is one of the biggest issues that needs to be improved.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

Your team was 1/6 in the red zone.

Yes with an Int grounding ending the half for one, and a poor play call for an INT for a second.... I give credit for the INT, but not for the bone headed int grounding... (although I personally was shocked they called it thought Branch was close enough but oh well..) EITHER of those done differently the Pats win, I dont think your D caused either ...The Intentional grounding the hawks were not close to sacking brady, and the INT well I said before 3rd and 1 w a 10 point lead RUN the ball..

Really? So Brady must totally suck huh? To toss the ball away when he still had time to find an open receiver? Nah, I remember that pass and I have it on DVR too. Brady WAS under pressure and it WAS an obvious IG with no receiver anywhere near it.

But hey, live in denial. Make excuses. The Pats know what happened. They got beat.

Richard Sherman doesn't just wanna get in your head, he wants to build a vacation home there.

PatsFanNH wrote:Umm let me state this, the INT in the end zone was the BONE HEAD OF ALL BONEHEAD play calls 3rd and 1 from the 5... your run it especially since you just ran it twice to get the third and one...

Another reason you one... ARRINGTON couldnt cover a cold and you got 2 TD off of his terrible coverage... (Although got Denard in and overall he played well so a plus for the Pats future.)

Also what WON the game for you was the 12th man, that is what caused the inability to audible out.. If Brady could Audible your D gets smoked.. the TWELTH man should take a bow.

That is funny because Seattle lives for teams to try to pound it in there on 3rd and short or goal. Just ask Carolina with 4 downs to get in the end zone with a good running game one of the best qb's suited for this kinda play, how well did they fair?